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Keep it clean kids! Need to pound this into children. My daughter is ten, this needs to be included w/ how to act in a restaurant

Or did you steal it and shamefully posted it in this dumb article?

I'm sorry, but I probably disagree with most readers on this. I don't see how employers rejecting candidates based on information they obtained regarding their personal life is *any* different than going off and finding-out what sort of religion or philosophy they subscribe to, and denying them based on that.

In fact, don't some sort of laws protect people from this? Why don't they apply here?

I don't think this story is over, by a long shot - eventually, someone will have to put their foot down and decide what is (legally) acceptable for consideration of employment. I'm not naive enough to think that will "solve" it (this same thing happened before the internet), but I do think something has to be done.

Good point. Frankly, good luck find anyone under 30 that doesn't have some picture of themselves wasted on a couch somewhere.

Cultural shift will happen when HR employees won't be able to find any suitable candidates for their positions based on what people do on their free time.

I never liked HR people. Like lawyers, they think they're doing a good job, they're really just getting in the way of progress.

I think all of us old enough to know better should breathe a sigh of relief that there was no Facebook when we were 20 years old. :-)

Just Some Guy: To my knowledge, employers can choose not to hire you for any reason, except for those specifically forbidden by law (eg, race, gender, religion, etc.) They can legally decide not to hire you because you are a smoker or have bad credit...I think we're a long way from protecting social behavior and risque pictures on the internet.

Hmm, you're probably right Amy. Whether the practice is "right", of course, is up for debate. And clearly existing legislation doesn't protect the worship of malt, barley and hops. ;)

Perhaps we can only hope that (as @lmkindabad says) HR people will eventually figure out that they're throwing out perfectly normal, ordinary people.

On a related note, due to an extremely common name I am often mistaken for a cult leader in the mid-west. This whole "Internet research" of candidates has so many flaws (and questionable ethics) that I can only hope there will one day be legislation to protect people from it.

I too think @Imkindabad has the right idea. Not only will there just be too many candidates with imperfect online profiles, but in a few more years a lot of the HR people will be the same folks running into trouble now.

I hear you about the mistaken identities. Having done internet searches on candidates myself, I know how hard it can be to tell if what you're seeing goes with the person you are looking for. With less internet-savvy researches, this could be devastating for a candidate.

My thought is that the best defense is to have a comprehensive LinkedIn profile that provides enough info that these people have a context for finding you. HR people should be starting there. Even better if you have a blog or site you can link to and discourage their reliance on random Google results.

only 70%. Haha

just make your stuff private, and make your profile pictures that can be seen respectable. are people really still this stupid??

Yeah, I always keep things clean - my Facebook is clean but doesn't have my real name, my MySpace still says I'm in high school and is full of bland stuff like "I like kittens and sunsets" (It's been unused for years, but I keep it up with my real name and a photo so they don't get a wrong and possibly racy or offensive account if they search), and I've got a professional-looking LinkedIn account too.

Also, don't forget to Google yourself and see what else comes up. And, most importantly, don't forget to Google your email address! I don't know how many employers do this, or if it's legal, but I've heard stories of people who've Googled a blind date's email address only to find he posted all over a sex fetish message board or something equally embarassing/tasteless.

As someone who helps candidates gain employment and manage their careers, this is something that I discuss with all of my clients. Yes, there are laws that prevent any candidate from unfair discrimination. However, what you CHOOSE to put online speaks to how you want to be presented, as much as your choice of what to wear to an interview reveals how you want to be perceived. We all know (or should know) that the internet is not a private place. Even emails are discoverable in legal proceedings. If you are comfortable portraying yourself in unflattering ways it does speak to the judgment you will exercise in a professional setting.

I've had plenty of people include their "vanity" email addy on resumes--along the ridiculous lines of "spankme69@yahoo.com". When I used to Google candidates I would often find MySpace pages that referenced gang affiliation, prior workplace shenanigans, and people talking "smack" about their old bosses and current job search interviews. As the practice of researching people on the Internet is now becoming a gray area legally, I don't do it anymore (and I'm not needing to hire anyone in this economy). But if you do, make sure you have your applicants sign an agreement saying you can do a background check on them (talk to your attorney about the language you need to use).

Always have a personal, professional and online persona.. For example, my on screen name is not my real government name which I use for job applications..

Have a professional email address.. that you hand out to employers etc..

Have a fun myspace and professional myspace/fb/twitter page..

Always be clear and confident that ur online personilty is just that.. ur online personality.. have fun, do what u do.. and when it comes time for work.. make sure u have a professional online outlet to o ur thing.. many school teachers do this already so they don't have their students all up in their biz

The internet is a social outlet for many. And what you post on line is your business, if that's how you want others to see yourself. Maybe folks will think twice about putting up drunken late night pics of themselves surrounded by empty PBR cans and Taco Bell wrappers. I see it as how you dress: if you want to wear something revealing, that's fine, but first impressions go a long way.

No Jamie, I don't think most people are "that stupid". But I think you're missing the point here -- your personal life is none of an employers business.

You should be offended by what amounts to an invasion of your personal space, and being judged not by your resume but by a bunch of essentially irrelevant personal trivia.

Surely I can't be the only one who sees this? Have we all forgotten our rights (and personal dignity)? It's tragic. :\

Wow this is stupid employers are turning away applicants for what you do when your off the clock and the government wonders why are economy is gettin worse and worse...that's just bullshit what I do in my free time is my business not my place of employment as long as im not doin stupid stuff at work it shouldn't matter....

Your personal life isn't your employer's business until you choose to make it public by putting it online. And in an economy where there are more applicants than jobs, you better believe that if you seem like you might be bad news, a potential employer will hire one of the other 50 applicants who definitely aren't.

Don't give people an easily accessible reason NOT to hire you. It may feel wrong or like an invasion of privacy, but the truth is, the Internet is a part of our lives, now, whether we like it or not. Either learn how to use privacy settings and pseudonyms effectively, start thinking about your online presence as an extension of your resume, or be prepared to be turned down by an employer who googles you.

What you do you in personal time absolutely is your business, but I think it is a little naive to completely compartmentalize personal and professional lives. Often times, there is overlap between the two, and for positions that can be completely separated, then yes you are right, but often times an employees underlying personality and character (what you do when no one is watching) carries over to the workplace, especially when you or your friends decide to share it on a public forum (and EVERYTHING on the internet is public).

This comes back to managing persona, whether that be of a brand or an individual. There are both positives and negatives to the internet being a completely open source... the flow of information is exactly that - open. So be prepared for whatever you put out into the public to be public.

The thing is, that it's not only drinking or crazy partying behavior they look at. What if my political beliefs aren't the same as my potential employer? I used to write for a living, freelance, prior to my current career. There are online articles I can no longer remove, nothing to clean up. People followed me on Twitter, partially for my journalistic comments and political rants. You can't delete old tweets, even if you make your account private (or even delete the entire account) the old ones still come up. In fact, I changed my email address to one I only used for Twitter and my name is no where in my account, but it still comes up when I search my name. Some of this is unavoidable. I have no crazy drunk party pictures, and I'm quite cryptic really, but someone could see my political opinion somewhere and still decide to pass me up.

Joey... this is a very interesting point. It's funny how much individuals can change throughout a lifetime... even over a short period of time, or from such events as a career change. It would be incredibly frustrating to not have the opportunity to sit down with a potential employer and explain how a view point or any situation that occurred in the past came to effect the person you are today. Often times, it is when we make mistakes that we come away with the most knowledge. Hopefully, good HR managers can decide how much emphasis to place on certain items over others... and as for those that discriminate - it's just a shame.

@Imkindabad, I'm one person under 30 with no pictures of myself drunk and passed out on a couch... because I'm one person under 30 who fails to see the fun in getting drunk and passing out.

If people kept their Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, etc profiles friends-only, they wouldn't have to worry about the professional backlash. It's really not that hard to figure out.

@Just Some Guy, we give up our privacy and our "personal rights" when we publish potentially damaging information of ourselves on the internet. Your personal life becomes your employer's business when you splash it up all over the internet for anyone to see. You choose what you share with the public forum the internet is, and if what you share could end up costing you a job opportunity, the fault is your own.

To all of you that think managing your identity is your personal responsibility and if you choose to put something out there that damages your employability, that's your own fault...

...can't wait to get a picture of you at a bar, or in some awkward position and publish it online.

Or better yet, if you ever rub someone the wrong way, and they chose to blog about you in an unfair way... that's all still opinion and hard to consider slander.

When THAT happens to you, you'll be singing a different tune folks. The rest of us will sit here with "told you faces", but don't worry, we don't rub it in too much.

The internet is become much more about what others say about you, than what you choose to release to the world.

The only way to stay completely private, is to avoid going out of your house and never get on the internet.

THAT is why I think HR policies are firing candidates before even proving themselves capable of performing is very short cited and will likely eventually... go away from the onslaught of information that is accumulated about you.

In ten or so years, privacy will be as quaint of notion as say writing a check to pay for crap at the mall... you'll likely wonder wtf is up with someone that has a squeaky clean online record.

And yes... all this free pontification comes from a cat that likes to scratch people.

Im Kindabad

I suspect that those of you who are shocked by this don't have a lot of experience hiring people. Managers and HR staff reject people for all kinds of reasons. Long before the Internet came along, I rejected people whose cover letters contained grammatical errors as well as one who sent his resume in on notebook paper written in pencil. When I did telephone interviews many didn't make the cut because they didn't listen to the questions I asked (thereby demonstrating poor communication skills).

I certainly wasn't a choir boy in college and I'd probably give someone the benefit of a doubt if their social media pages reveal that they know how to party hardy. But if those pages contained slurs or negative comments against their "friends" or demonstrated poor judgement (grading on a curve for immaturity) then I'd cross them off the list.

If you're within a year of entering the work force full time, you should clean up your site.

Be the brand.

Actually, I used to completely disagree with the fact employer's do use this public information against job-seeking individuals. So, I will speak from both sides.
Regretfully, in the past I have engaged in a public workplace-bashing on the internet via comments/posts with other co-workers who were on my 'Friends List." (Let me just add, right here, it's probably never a good idea to network with your co-workers.)
Also, I took a picture of a former co-worker in a shaving cream bikini (u can't judge me, but you can try), however, she turned around a made that picture I took, in my home, her profile picture on a popular social-networking website.
Not only did she catch heat by the company immediately, but with it being such a tight-knit group (like most workplaces are!), word was that it was taken in my house, therefore, I contributed. Who knew?
Sometimes we just don't think. I guess I really never had an argument for my past view of why employer's should NOT do this, other than the fact that it was self-justified resentment towards the company for snooping around. Oh, how things change! And how stupid and laughable it is to admit being SO wrong! I guess I always felt like they owed me, so how dare they? I'm sure some of you can relate, whether you admit it or not.

On the flip side, I am absolutely thrilled that this is an open practice. I know a lot of REALLY good-hearted people, whom I love and respect, but by looking at their profile pages-- My opinion may be quite the judgemental one.
So, just by that virtue alone, I know people cannot be judged solely on their online life because sometimes it just isn't accurate, it is outdated, or it is exaggerated in just all the wrong ways. (I believe someone mentioned the "worship of hops & barley;" this is what I mean by exaggerated in all the "wrong" ways.)
We do all deserve our private lives, even though the internet does qualify as "public domain," whether or not anything is set to "private."
However, this is not a matter of privacy, I personally believe. It truly reflects the human nature of trash & burn and "F--- everybody in my wake!" There is a lot to be said of a person online... are they more outspoken and ballsy sitting at a keyboard than face to face? Do they engage in gossip on their profile pages? Personally, I would not hire someone who always seems to have an axe to grind or that gossips publicly because I can almost guarantee these character traits are not just limited to "private time" outside of work. These things alone say a lot about a person's character, leaving aside all the drunken photos.